


This House, This Heart

by violet_storms



Series: femslash february 2021 [5]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Character Turned Into a Ghost, F/F, Femslash February, Ghosts, Grief/Mourning, Haunting, Paranormal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-09
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-17 04:54:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29836311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/violet_storms/pseuds/violet_storms
Summary: They are all sick and tired of the ghosts, but no one decides to do anything about it until her.
Relationships: Cho Chang/Luna Lovegood
Series: femslash february 2021 [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2144880
Comments: 1
Kudos: 4





	This House, This Heart

Hypocrisy is the first thing she tastes when Cho unlocks her front door and steps into her living room. It has the flavor of gold and iron, metal burning in the back of her throat, but Cho doesn’t even flinch at the acid taste. “Welcome home,” says Luna, from her seat by the fire.

Cho shakes the snow from her hair and throws her coat over the back of the couch. “Hi.”

“You’ve got dark circles,” says Luna, peering into her face. Cho glances away.

“I’ve always got dark circles.”

“They’re darker today.”

“Thanks.” Cho goes into the kitchen and puts the kettle on the stove. Her teeth are chattering, and she needs something hot to drink. Luna calls to her from the other room.

“You need to start sleeping better.”

“Easy for you to say,” says Cho. “You don’t sleep.”

“That’s because I’m dead,” says Luna serenely. 

Cho pours water into the kettle and turns the flame on beneath it, her wand sitting unused on the counter where she threw it down when she came in. “I don’t think this is very healthy,” Luna continues. “You and your dark circles.” 

Cho leans against the kitchen’s door frame and watches the other girl flicker in the light of the dying fire. “I don’t think _this_ is very healthy,” she says. “You. And me.”

“It isn’t,” Luna agrees. “Maybe you should let me leave.”

“I thought it was the other way around,” says Cho.

Luna smiles sadly.

“I sleep fine,” says Cho, looking away from her again. “You know I do.”

“I don’t know any such thing,” says Luna. “I hear every time you wake up, you realize that? I know about the nightmares.”

“After what we’ve been through, it’d be stranger if I _didn’t_ have nightmares.”

“Maybe,” says Luna. “But I hear other things too. Voices.” She tilts her head to the side. “Do you even know how dangerous it is, the line you’re walking?”

Cho opens her mouth to answer and the kettle whistles, just in time. Cho turns and goes over to the stove, pouring the boiling water into her mug and adding the teabag. She curls her hands around the porcelain, enjoying the feel of the too-hot liquid burning against her skin. Then she takes the tea with her to the couch, where she sits across from Luna’s translucent form.

“Do you really want to do this tonight?” she asks.

“Better sooner than later, don’t you think?” says Luna. “Your mental stability only gets worse from here.”

“And whose fault is that?” snaps Cho. “Mine, or the ghost haunting my house?”

“I’m not haunting anything,” says Luna steadily. “I’m here for one reason, and that’s because you want me to be. Not like your clients.”

“They’re not my clients,” says Cho automatically.

“Why not? They pay you.”

That’s true; they always insist on it, no matter how much Cho wishes they wouldn’t. She protests, but they are so persistent, and her house is so cold, so she ends up taking the money. Every time she arrives home she hopes the coins will disappear like Leprechaun gold from her front pocket, but they never do.

What Cho does is not exorcism, not really. Exorcism is a Muggle idea, a religious idea, an idea that has no place in the wizarding world. Cho’s spell may make it so that the ghosts can no longer walk the floors, but they are still present, hovering on the edges of her vision. So, in order to rid her clients of their ghosts, she untethers the spirits from their homes and ropes them to herself instead, and if they crowd in on her dreams at night, well, that’s the price she pays. It’s the closest she can get to exile. It’s the best that she can do.

“What debt do you think you’re making up by doing this?” Luna inquires quietly, as Cho sips her scalding tea.

“You know what debt.”

There is a pause.

“I don’t blame anyone,” says Luna.

“I didn’t ask.”

“I know,” says Luna. “You’ve never asked because you’re afraid of what I’ll say. You’re worried that I blame you because you blame yourself, but I don’t. It wasn’t your fault.”

“Please stop,” says Cho.

“And you’re mad at me because you think I _should_ be blaming you, and the fact that I’m not makes you feel even worse, and I’m sorry about that, but it was no one’s fault and I won’t say it was.”

“For Merlin’s sake, Luna,” says Cho. “Just leave me alone, won’t you? Just let me be.”

“It’s not my decision,” says Luna simply. “It’s yours.”

Silence falls over the two of them, and Cho wishes, not for the first time, that the spirits were restless instead of resigned. It would be so much easier that way: easier to hate them, easier to want them gone. She can’t count the number of times people have tried to stop her at the last moment, whispering, “I’ve changed my mind, they can stay, it won’t bother me anymore.”

Cho always shakes her head. _No. It's hard enough to move on without the person you loved standing around the corner, watching you. Trust me on this one. Just trust me._

Gold and iron.

“Don’t I have to try and help them?” she says softly, staring down into her mug. “What kind of person am I, if I don’t? It’s what you would have done.”

“It doesn’t matter what I would have done,” says Luna. “I’m dead.”

“I’d trade places with you if I could.”

“I know. You loved me very much.”

Cho looks up at her. “I still do,” she says. “I still love you. That’s the worst part about losing someone. You keep on loving them anyway. It doesn’t end.”

It never ends. Every day Cho wakes up and Luna is dead. Every breath she takes is one Luna won’t. Every single second that passes is another spent wishing she were alive again. But you can’t wish someone back to life. Cho should know. She’s more familiar with grief than most. Death is a foreign concept for wizards; magic extends their lives and cures their illnesses, numbing them to the reality that one day they’ll die like any Muggle. Losing a grandparent is not something wizards are prepared for, much less losing their classmates, friends, children. They have not been taught how to mourn. They’ve never had a reason to learn before.

Cho has.

“You don’t have to spend the rest of your life helping other people learn to do something they can learn on their own,” says Luna. “You don’t owe that to them.”

“Isn’t that the point of living?” says Cho. “Helping people? I can make it easier on them, so I should.” After all, they were all sick and tired of the ghosts, but no one decided to do anything about it until her. She started this. She has to see it through to the end, one way or another. “If I can’t have peace, I should at least make it so others can.”

“You could have it if you wanted,” says Luna gently. “If you would let me go.”

The fire crackles dimly in the grate. The mug clasped between Cho’s hands has long since lost its warmth. Her teeth are chattering again. She is cold down to her bones. All around her, the house is shivering on its thin foundation.

Gold and iron, iron and gold. Cho has never claimed to have the strongest heart.

“No, stay a little longer,” she says. “I’m freezing.”

**Author's Note:**

>   
>    
> 


End file.
